Apple provides a solution that is a single unit, hardware AND software that is tied together. Think of it as a car, the whole thing is purchased at one time, fu

Apple provides a solution that is a single unit, hardware AND software that is tied together. Think of it as a car, the whole thing is purchased at one time, functions entirely on its own from end to end, but you can add features to it. The alternatives are allowed, but you are buying a singular device, not a platform for other developers per se, it just happens to allow developers to create software for it. On the other hand, you have Microsoft which has historically been a platform software solution, building a culture of allowing anyone to build on it, licensing portions and features to developers for them to build on. Until recently, there was only tepid attempts at hardware branded Microsoft where as Apple has always been hardware bound to software to the point you can't easily install OSX on anything other than Apple hardware. The same cannot be said for Microsoft, the only other company that is bound by this rule of multiple defaults. That rule came about because Microsoft had licensing rules that prevent devs from using MS software on their own hardware if that hardware included competing software. If you wanted to use Windows, you HAD TO use IE only. Microsoft was using monopolistic practices, but did not have a monopoly btw. In a nutshell, Apple is selling a singular device that happens to have a doorway that allows users to install addition software to expand the hardware/OS beyond its default intended (by Apple standards based on analyzing the user market) purposes. Other alternatives are hardware solutions that allow your choice of software as middleware to gain access to the hardware functionality. Two hugely different ideologies. One is a fork, the other is build-a-bear.